a world of café stories

OR Espresso Bar, Ghent

By KENNY MAH and CK LIM

This was one café that seemed to be more people than coffee, which is a lovely thing, really. Located across the street from the celebrated Minard Theatre, OR Espresso Bar appears to be the meeting point for all coffee lovers in Ghent. Be it a slowly hand-crafted filter brew or a lusty ristretto, everyone is deep in coffee and conversation.

The people factor seems to be a happy by-product as the original intention was more geeky – to create a “live” coffee lab where founders Tom Janssen and Katrien Pauwels could learn from the coffee they served and further refine their roasts.

When the duo first met, they were both working in IT. Neither had any experience in coffee other than Janssen’s grandfather having been a roaster. So what spurred these two entrepreneurs on were only a passion for the bean and a desire to introduce specialty coffee to Belgium.

After a sabbatical year traveling around Asia, Janssen and Pauwels finally decided to start their own coffee roastery in 2001. Operating from a small shop in Aalst, a town near Brussels, they built a client base of wholesale customers, restaurants and cafés.

The next step, naturally, was to open their own coffee bar – OR Espresso Bar in Ghent – their very first one. The café was such a success that Janssen and Pauwels soon opened a second location in bustling Brussels. Today OR Coffee has a micro roastery, a coffee training center, and three espresso bars in Ghent and Brussels.

The ambience in the original shop in Ghent is bustling but comfortable too. A cosy place to curl up with a cuppa and people watch at the long bar running alongside the window. If this is how the Belgians enjoy their coffee, you can’t blame us for joining in happily.